Star Wars Galaxies Chapter 7 Interview

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Our chance to ask about the heroic encounters, collection system and other new elements in the latest content update

By Richard Aihoshi - 'Jonric'

Located amidst several hyperspace routes, the inhospitable desert planet Tatooine is a source of many minerals and other resources for those able to harvest them. Its residents include both hard-working locals and a criminal element led by the Hutts. The Empire has a presence, as do Rebel sympathizers. Endor is a forest moon orbiting a gas giant bearing the same name. The former's terrain incorporates treetop villages built by the teddy bear-like Ewoks, the Gorax caves and various other unspoiled areas. Naboo is a geographically diverse planet with regions that range from the murky Lianorm Swamps to the icy Gallo Mountain Range, verdant jungles and thick forests, all teeming with unusual creatures. Home to both the warlike Gungans and peaceful humans, it is an Imperial stronghold; the Emperor's stunning retreat there is often the site of summits with high-ranking officials.

Star Wars Galaxies is the online world based on the famed property that has expanded far beyond its cinematic origins. A collaboration between developer Sony Online Entertainment and publisher LucasArts, it takes place during the Galactic Civil War in a game universe that includes the planets named above plus Han Solo's homeworld of Corellia, Yavin 4 where the first Death Star was destroyed, Dathomir, Lok, Rori and Talus. Players can select from professions such as Jedi, Bounty Hunter, Smuggler, Commander, Trader and Medic, and can also take part in a space combat element where skilled pilots can introduce adversaries to the taste of their blasters. Updates are introduced on a regular basis; the major ones, known as Chapters, launch roughly every couple of months. LucasArts Producer Jake Neri and Associate Producer Tim Temmerman agreed to tell us about next one.

Jonric: What are the main additions and improvements that Chapter 7 will bring to Star Wars Galaxies, and are they primarily aimed at certain levels or types of players?

Jake Neri: Chapter 7 introduces some cool new elements to Star Wars Galaxies, one being the Collection Journal, and another the introduction of three instanced Heroic Encounters. The former allows players of all levels to pick up collections (essentially quests) that require you to go out and find, kill or loot objects or creatures around the galaxy. Once completed, the collections appear in your journal and reward the player with badges and sometimes loot or other items. For example, we have a collection that allows the player to gather written pieces of Count Dooku's legend. Once it's completed, the reward is a decorative saber hilt to place in the character's home.

We've copied the entire city of Mos Espa into an instance where players will be fighting Tusken Raiders. It's another high-level, big group effort, as players will fight to reclaim the entire city.

As for Chapter 7's three new heroic instanced encounters, they are aimed at our high-level players. The locations are Lok, Mos Espa and Dathomir, and they require players to group with each other to take on epic challenges that, if successfully completed, yield high-level loot. A new quest hub has also been added, the township of Aurilia where players can gather to take on high-level challenges, or to form groups before traveling to the heroic encounters.

Jonric: Has this chapter taken a little longer to release than the previous three or four, which seemed to be about three months apart?

Jake Neri: I guess it depends on if you count all the stuff the team has been working on in between Chapter 6 and 7. We delivered a series of major bug fixes, as well as adding the Imperial theme park, while also executing our home purge event that freed up tons of real estate for our players to build homes on. So yeah, we have had a little more time between the actual chapters, but we have been busy and we have been focused.

In addition, Chapter 7 is one of the most robust we've released in the past two years, and introduces a couple of substantial new systems to the game that have required more development time. Our Tusken encounter, for example, is quite complicated, and required a lot of scripting and logic to get it to the level of quality we wanted. One of our designers, Travis Hicks, had to iterate on it quite a few times. I will say that our team's philosophy is to deliver high-quality chapters. We are committed to taking the time to get them right before releasing them.

Jonric: Without giving away too much information, what's the encounter on planet Lok about, where does it take place, and what makes it especially interesting?

Tim Temmerman: The Lok encounter has players battling IG-88 and his crew of battle droids in a new instance. The players will find themselves in the middle of a droid facility, where they'll fight wave after wave of different droids using different tactics. Eventually, IG-88 will step in the battle. It's definitely a top tier, high-end encounter, so players will want to be in groups of six to eight 90s to put up a good show. I won't spoil all the story details, but you can grab the quest that leads to the encounter in the township of Aurilia.

Jonric: How about the Mos Espa one? How much of the city does it involve, and what's the situation or problem the players have to address?

Tim Temmerman: This encounter is huge. We've copied the entire city of Mos Espa into an instance where players will be fighting Tusken Raiders. It's another high-level, big group effort, as players will fight to reclaim the entire city. We wanted this to be a complex instance where they do more than just fight endlessly, so it will definitely involve some strategy; you'll get bonuses for liberating certain city buildings, and can assign townsfolk to help you out.

It can take a long time; on one run, we spent nearly a whole hour trying to free the town. In the end, we've got a new boss that I don't want to give too much away about, and players can get some high-level armor that will improve their character's stats.